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Convicted Driver Insurance

new_pedestrian

Established Member
I wasn't expecting this, but it turns out that if you have a drink driving conviction, your home insurance may be invalid, and you won't find out until you try to claim on it!

My home contents insurance was up for renewal recently and I decided to shop around for the best price. It turns out, though, that almost all insurers won't take me because I have a criminal conviction. It doesn't seem to matter whether the conviction is for drink driver or serial murder, it's just a straight yes or no question "do you have any convictions?"

The few insurers who will take me on want an extortionate price, and it isn't as if I could just neglect to mention my conviction because upon claiming these things are checked out and the insurance would be invalid and therefore a waste of money.

Worth checking on for those people who, like me, hadn't even though tof things like home insurance being an issue. One more punishment to add to the list!
 
I wasn't expecting this, but it turns out that if you have a drink driving conviction, your home insurance may be invalid, and you won't find out until you try to claim on it!

My home contents insurance was up for renewal recently and I decided to shop around for the best price. It turns out, though, that almost all insurers won't take me because I have a criminal conviction. It doesn't seem to matter whether the conviction is for drink driver or serial murder, it's just a straight yes or no question "do you have any convictions?"

The few insurers who will take me on want an extortionate price, and it isn't as if I could just neglect to mention my conviction because upon claiming these things are checked out and the insurance would be invalid and therefore a waste of money.

Worth checking on for those people who, like me, hadn't even though tof things like home insurance being an issue. One more punishment to add to the list!

Oh this sounds just wonderful! Yet another thing we are hammered with. I have been looking at insurance quotes as Im due my licence back very soon if all goes well with the medical which it should as I hardly drink but still a bit worried due to some other peoples experience on these forums.

Anyway due to the fact I will have been banned for 27 months, not only has my car insurance costs shot up because of the DR10 (which I expected), I have lost all my no claims bonus as its been over two years, this means my car insurance is over 4x what it once was!!! If I still had my NCB the cost would be 2x as much as it was, to be expected really, but over 4x just takes the piss. Yet one more thing to add to the growing list of what all this palava has cost me. Its been a very very very costly experience indeed, one that will never ever be repeated for as long as I breathe!!
 
I can see how an insurance company would view people with criminal records as a higher insurance risk than those without them, but surely someone who's been caught drunk driving isn't in the same bracket for home insurance as someone who's served time for, say, burglarly, insurance fraud, or mass murder?

I suppose it's a good thing if our misery helps to prevent others from making the same mistake, but still - the courts have handed down a ban and a fine, that's supposedly our punishment for what we did. It feels unjust to be nudged out of something like home insurance.

Five years from now when my conviction is "spent" things should be back to normal insurance-wise, but until then I might as well have "DRUNK DRIVER" branded on my forehead.
 
I've just had my buildings and contents renewal notice through. When I asked my insurer (Tesco) about which convictions they required, it was made clear to me that motoring offences were to be excluded. I rang a second time to make sure a different Tesco person would say the same thing (they did). Now I know DD is a criminal offence, but surely it is also a motoring offence and therefore I have no obligation to declare it?
 
Yes it's an offence involving motoring, but it's not a "motoring offence" in the way they mean it. You don't get a criminal record for speeding, for example, but you do for drunk driving.

As an extreme example of the difference, imagine if you got into your car and deliberately ran someone over and then reversed back over them a few times to make sure. You'd get convicted of murder and you wouldn't be able to say "Yes, but surely this was also a motoring offence!"

I know this is obviously a different level of criminality, but what I'm saying is that your criminal conviction doesn't get downgraded to a motoring offence just because it involved a car.

The trouble is that even if you get the insurance without declaring your DD conviction, it's if you have to make a claim that they'll look for reasons not to pay out. As soon as your DD conviction surfaces they'll refuse to pay your claim and you won't have a leg to stand on because you'll have obtained the insurance cover under a false declaration.
 
I take your point that just because I was in a car, it's not necessarily a "motoring offence".

With this in mind, I called Tesco again and fully explained my conviction and sentence. The guy told me that, from their point of view, a motoring offence that hasn't resulted in custody doesn't affect eligibilty to obtain insurance or the premium. I asked him to put a note on my file to show that we'd had this discussion.

I guess each insurer has their own interpretation, but it looks like mine apply a bit of common sense when it comes to criminal convictions.
 
I renewed my insurance recently and they told me you don't need to declare it and my premium was the same
 
I rang my insurance company ( Santander ) to check if it was ok and no problems, I did ask them to make a note on my account.








6 days to go:D
 
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